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Is Santi Cazorla’s fitness crucial to Arsenal’s trophy chances?

Arsenal’s squad is now bursting at the seams with talented players, and we should have adequate replacements for any injuries we might sustain, but it would appear that the loss of Santi Cazorla may be one hurdle that we can’t cover for.

The little Spaniard took a knock against Ludogrets and Arsene Wenger was forced to put Mohamed Elneny on the pitch as Coquelin’s partner in central midfield, and the end result was the loss of two points against Middlesbrough. Wenger was asked if this was a crucial loss, and he replied: “Yeah, of course. You miss always, of course, Cazorla. At home he is from deep midfield into the final third, his pass is always quick and accurate. And, yes.”

Straight after the Ludogrets game,Santi himself took to social media to reassure the fans that the injury was not serious and he could be fit for this weekend, but with Wenger not even putting the Spaniard on the bench it would appear that Santi has not yet recovered. Wenger’s injury update yesterday was not quite so confident. “Cazorla – I don’t really know because we have to see how he recovers on Monday, ” Le Prof said.

The fact is that last season Arsenal were fighting for the title in January, but once we lost Cazorla for a few months our challenge at the top seemed to drop away as we surrendered points left right and centre. Our recovery to take second place ominously concided with his return to fitness.

With Santi now aged 31, we could expect him to need a bit longer to recover than our younger players, but is he really that important that we can’t even beat Middlesbrough without him?

Yeap Carzola was missed but a world class team like Arsenal shouldn’t be complaining about missing one player for a home game against a newly promoted team. I just felt that his was a game for the Ox to have started. We should’ve showed a bit more urgency from the start. Like Chelsea did to spoil Mou’s plan.
Ah well we cant win them all – its just a good thing that City, Spuds and Man U managed to drop points this wknd as well. I just hope we figure a plan against these teams that sit back and defend soon.

Yes, he is. But so is Xhaka, Ozil, Sanchez all the boys. I mean this is a movie we already seen before. Coming from UCL and playing against a bus parking team. 6 seasons in a row in October/November. Same thing and you know it. It is frustrating, I agree but what can you do? Except Leicester which are saving their players for UCL (they won’t see it again for decades anymore) where the money is crucial all teams lost points.Even Real Madrid and if it wasn’t for the ref, Barcelona would have not win it. Expect Chelsea and Liverpool to mount a serious challenge for the title this year. Title is not guaranteed to anyone.

Cazorla is very important to Arsenals chances. But i feel we were unlucky in our last match, once again the opposition keeper turned himself to the best keeper in the world, helped by our woefull goal attempts. Once Xhaka and Cazorla are back , teams will find it more difficult packing the box, because of their accurate long and short passes, and tendency to shoot from outside the box. Conclusively, no cause for concern except u r a Man Utd fan of course. *winks*

If we’d be mature enough to put sentiments aside, I’d say we bring back Fabregas to alternate with Cazorla. They’re are a rare breed of players who can break the opposition down from deep with one genius long pass that no else can see until it’s too late, Pirlo, Xavi and Alonso are the only other guys that come to mind when talking of such game changing passes, Xhaka can become one too but he has to develop the same sort of vision, these players don’t run much with the ball, the ball does the running for them and delivered to the right address. Fabregas is rotting on the bench at Chelski and is going for about 20 million pounds and in a significantly weak bargaining position in terms of wages and play time… I’ll put it this way, imagine Fabregas was available to us when Cazorla was out injured last season?

31 is not old, but a player of Santi’s size and with his injury record needs to given more protection, by his fellow players and his manager and coaches.

We do have another player like Santi and that is zelalem. Let him start against reading. Do not risk Santi or coquelin for that matter let them rest up for Sunderland ludogrets and spurs.

Wenger should pick his team for saturday and then pick x1 different players for reading. The bench should be a mix of the academy and first-day, with the first teamers only being used if totally necessary.

It is important but not crucial. At 31 going on 32 in Decemeber, he cannot be expected to play 38-45 games (including Cups) a season. A sky report on Cazorla showed Arsenal averaged 2.15 points with him (82 points a season- enough to beat Leicester to the title last season!) and 1.63 (62 points or 7th last season) without him. What is important is to 1. keep him fit 2. Have a very good and fit back ups (Ramsey, Wilshere, and to an extent Xhaka, Elneny, Ox) and 3. Have a plan B that plays to the players coming in that cannot deliver like for like. The sky report showed Cazorla found Ozil 23,27, and 28 times with passes in his last 3 league matches. Elneny’s top pass was to Coquelin against Boro (17) while Coquelin’s was Elneny (16).
Unfortunately, this match came too soon for Ramsey (option 2) and Giroud (option 3). There are 29 matches to go but it emphasizes the need to have all your players available. I bet if Wenger suspected Cazorla might not be fit for the weekend, he would have appealed Xhaka’s card. A little more humility with his riches of midfielders would have increased our options against Boro.

Gooners to me I feel this is where ramsey is needed,cazorla has the technical ability to unlock tight defences and good shot on him so is ramsey trust me he can deliver with his lung bursting runs and shot he can unlock defences too, watch him during the euros when Ramsey got suspended that was the end for Wales.
I believe Ramsey would wants to prove a point by trying to win back his place in the team and it is a good thing. I’m happy for the competition for places it is just beautiful.

I think the closest we have to the way Santi play is Jack wilshere, when fit and rocking because of the way he holds the ball and guard it well all the way from deep, I think with few tips from the little magician himself then jack can be his hire.
BOTTOM LINE:
Fitness.

anti is the only Cm we have that take on an opponent….we have too many ball passers in our midfield…..same set of midfield players….since Rosicky and wilshere are not with us again, scoring against defensive minded team will just be difficult for us…..we don’t use to struggle to create chances against defensive minded during Those days of hleb, fabregas, rosicky, diaby….these set of guys have great footwork…..We just need to keep Santi and Ramsey fit again….Xhaka,Elneny and ozil are just good with passes, but when you talk of making runs with ball, taking on an opponent, making penetrating runs am sorry they are below average….we missed Wilshere and Rosicky against Middlesbrough.

santi is the only Cm we have that can take on an opponent….we have too many ball passers in our midfield…..same set of midfield players….since Rosicky and wilshere are not with us again, creating chances and spaces against defensive minded team team will just be difficult for us…..we don’t use to struggle to create chances against defensive minded team during Those days of hleb, fabregas, rosicky, diaby….these set of guys have great footwork…..We just need to keep Santi and Ramsey fit again….Xhaka,Elneny and ozil are just good with passes, but when you talk of making runs with ball, taking on an opponent, making penetrating runs am sorry they are below average….we missed Wilshere and Rosicky against Middlesbrough.

Most people were fine with Elneny and Coq before the game, I myself thought it should be fine. Admin mentioned starting Ox which wasn’t received too well. I thought we were very slow in midfield but I thought the lads up front were all over the place, we didn’t have that synchronized look about us. At the back too we just didn’t look ourselves, I think it was a case of a goal will come eventually we just need to give it to a big player. Cazorla would’ve helped, so too could Ramsey Giroud and Perez. Arsene needs to stop fearing the slightest change interrupting our streak. All the best mangers know how to tweek without our game changing too much, Fergie was tops at this. We would have looked fresher with a bit more care gone into it. Like Alexis for instance, we need to try and keep him fresh. Cazorla like the article says is a big player, he would have been fine for the weekend with a tweek here and there. As good as Arsene’s been this season, I think these two dropped points are down to him. I could be wrong of course, 20 years experience versus my inkling, hmm.